UFC 318: Holloway vs Poirier 3 - Jul 19 ???

[Bruce85]

Turns out the 2nd fight is on the UFC YouTube channel and free to watch, going to give it a watch now. 
 

Predictions:

I went Max in the poll but it’s coin flip really, i still think Max gets the win back here on points in a close split decision. 
 

Kopylov by rear naked choke late in the 3rd when Costa is blowing out his ass. 
 

I’m copying Egg on this one but Pitbull by decision, the Bellator losing streak can’t go on. 
 

Holland will be to much for D-Rod and get a late TKO. 
 

Zellhuber by 30-27 decision. If Dustin is getting ppv points he must have upset Dana as putting Johnson on the main card isn’t going to help get any more buys! 
 

Really looking forward to this one, it will be sad to see Dustin call it a day but he deserves a proper send off. 

Edited July 19, 2025 by Bruce85

[wandshogun09]

My main card picks are the same as yours @Egg Shen except I’m going with Ige over Pitbull. Hope I’m wrong on that but I don’t have a ton of faith in Pitbull at this point and Ige is decent.

Here’s your usual fight day visuals…

[Panhead]

4 hours ago, wandshogun09 said:

As far as I know he went into real estate full time.

Got to be better than getting punched in the face, I suppose. 

[Panhead]

I'll be honest, I've felt really indifferent towards the UFC this year. Bar the odd fight, my excitement for it has been the lowest it's ever been in the 10+ years that I've been watching it. I've skipped prelims and entire Apex cards for the first time ever. The constant parading of Trump, while kids are literally getting locked in cages, was ruining it for me. The constant reminders of what an absolute pair of cunts that Conor and Jon Jones are. Apex card after Apex card. I wasn't enjoying it anymore.

The announcement of the White House event for next year, and the thought of that orange faced cretin and Plastic Caesar sat lording it up, had nearly made me stop watching entirely. 

So I started watching the main card on Sunday morning. The intro video was really good, showcasing NOLA and paying tribute to Poirier. But it wasn't until Holland vs Rodriguez that I remembered why I fell in love with this sport in the first place. It'll probably get overlooked in the FOTY discussions, but it was everything I love about MMA. I still feel very uncomfortable with the UFC getting any of my money at the moment, but it was a nice reminder of what got me watching MMA in the first place  

[wandshogun09]

I went 0-5 on my main card picks ? was a decent show though. But a bit of a weird one in that the first six fights all ended with finishes, then every fight after that went the distance. Still, the better actual fights on the card went to the judges.

Max Holloway finally clawed one back! Still the BMF champ but I think more important than that was just him getting that win and not going 0-3 in another trilogy. As much as I’d have liked to have seen Dustin win in his last fight, this result was for the best if we’re being honest. Poirier winning would’ve been a great ‘moment’ but Holloway is the one who’s sticking around and a third loss to a guy who was retiring would’ve been a hard one to bounce back from. Especially when he’s trying to make a fresh start at Lightweight. He needed this win. It was a really good fight. It was never gonna be bad, was it? Not sure I agreed with the couple of 49-46 scorecards but I’d have to rewatch it and score it properly and I wasn’t on first viewing, I was just enjoying it and soaking it in. The important thing is the right man won. It felt closer to me than the scorecards reflected but I definitely felt like Max won. Fight itself wasn’t quite as good as their epic second one in 2019 but not many fights are gonna match that. It was another banger though, one of my favourites of the year so far.

This is what it’s all about though. The story of this show going in was that it was Dustin Poirier’s swansong and it was rightly the focus after the fight. Whether he won or lost, it was the right thing to do to give him his moment. And what a moment it was. Proper end of an era. He’s gonna be missed. I said all the way through that I wouldn’t have picked Max as Dustin’s final opponent, just because it was already 2-0 to Dustin. I got over that and was bang up for the fight like everyone else but it wouldn’t have been my choice if it was up to me. Thinking about it though, really it was perfect. If Dustin’s last fight was against some cunt like McGregor or Covington, it would’ve been unbearable if he lost and you know cretins like that wouldn’t have let him have his moment post-fight even if he won. With Max you knew there’d be none of that. And if Dustin had to lose on his way out, it makes the pill a bit sweeter to swallow that at least it was a guy like Holloway who beat him. Max was absolutely class post-fight, as you’d expect. After such a win, avenging those previous losses, he just quickly said his piece and then gave Dustin the spotlight. Hearing Max get booed at various points throughout fight week and on the night felt completely alien. He’s a pure babyface. I get it was Dustin’s hometown so they had to go against Max. But still, how are you booing that man? Loved seeing the respect they’ve given each other since the fight as well. 

There’s a video doing the rounds of Poirier talking to Holloway’s son Rush backstage after the fight and you can tell that boy’s being raised right.

Lovely full circle moment as well if you remember those scenes of Rush crying his eyes out when Max lost to Dustin in 2019. So yeah, now it’s all over, I’m actually glad Poirier went out against Holloway. Two of the coolest and most badass fighters in UFC history going to battle one last time. Beautiful fight and post-fight moment for Dustin and well deserved. As much as I’ll miss watching him fight, I genuinely hope he never comes back. Even with the loss, this felt perfect. The opponent, the fact it was in Louisiana, the whole fight week, the fight itself, the post-fight stuff. Most fighters could only dream of a farewell like that.

Thought Paulo Costa looked better than he has in a long time. Certainly a lot better than he did in that rotten fight with Strickland last time. I fancied Kopylov to beat him here and I thought it’d kind of be a bit of a coming out party for him, getting a win over a decent name in the division. Costa showed he’s not done yet though. Never thought he was much of a kicker but he was throwing some good ones here. Kopylov’s known for his body kicks and I don’t think he expected Costa to bring the heat with them the way he did.

Good stuff. I was surprised to see Costa is still only 34 when I was typing the opening post. Seems like he’s been around forever and I just assumed he’d be pushing 40 by now. If he can keep his head on straight and be more active, he could still be a bit of a player at 185. Not like the division is mega deep. He’s enough of a name and the kind of character who would probably get a title shot a bit easier than others as well. DDP vs Costa could be fun down the line, both the press conference and the fight. Obviously DDP’s gotta get past Khamzat first though. No point counting those chickens just yet. Khamzat vs Costa wouldn’t upset me either though, there’s obviously beef there judging by Costa’s post-fight comments and they were scheduled to fight in the past. Regardless, Costa is gonna have to win one or two more before he’s in a position to really make a strong case for the title shot. You have to assume the winners of the upcoming Whittaker vs De Ridder and Imavov vs Borralho fights are ahead of him.

Rodriguez vs Holland was a really fun scrap. Wasn’t expecting much from this, to be honest, but I really enjoyed it. It was wild and sloppy in places but it was definitely entertaining. Back and forth with a few big shifts in momentum. I really thought Holland was gonna get him out of there in that last round but D-Rod somehow survived and ended up on top in mount at the end of the fight. One of those nutty fights where I completely lost track of the scoring.

Pitbull finally got that first UFC win but it wasn’t great to watch. There were flashes of the old Pitbull there, he had Ige in some bother in the second round. But I don’t know, he just looks slow now. To be expected given his age. He’s not in prime form anymore and this was still a very good win for him so I don’t wanna be too negative. It was obviously better than his fight with Yair last time. But he just looks like a guy on borrowed time to me. My initial thought when he signed with the UFC was that it was too late for him to make a serious splash but he might be able to cash in going the ‘fun fights’ route like Chandler. I’m not sure he’s even got that in him at this stage though. Not sure who you give him next. Josh Emmett maybe?

Michael Johnson’s weird run of winning fights he should lose and losing fights he should win continues. I was pretty confident Zellhuber was gonna beat MJ here. Actually, it was the one result I was most sure about on the main card. Shows what I know. Johnson’s just one of those fighters where you never know from one fight to the next but he looked fast and sharp here and Zellhuber seemed to have little idea what to do with him other than just keep throwing body kicks. I don’t know if it was Johnson being a lefty which was troubling Zellhuber but Zellhuber and his team would’ve known he was a southpaw when they signed the contract and they had a whole training camp to prep for that so it’s no excuse. Disappointing from Zellhuber. Johnson’s lost a lot but he wins enough to stay on the roster and, to be fair, he’s on a three fight win streak now. He’s gonna still be fighting at UFC 500 at this rate and will end up with a 52-49 record.

Vinicius Oliveira vs Kyler Phillips was a letdown. I’ve pretty much abandoned any hopes I had of Phillips going onto be anything special at this point. There was a time I thought he was a legit prospect at 135, around the time he beat Song Yadong I remember thinking he had a bright future. Now, not so much. Just seems like he hasn’t progressed at all and his gas tank isn’t what it needs to be in a division like Bantamweight and especially with the style he tries to fight with. Oliveira’s alright but awkward. Seems like he peaked with that spectacular flying knee KO in his UFC debut last year but I’ve not been blown away since. He still had enough about him to beat Phillips here though.

Brendan Allen vs Marvin Vettori was a pleasant surprise. Both were coming off losses and I think Vettori had been making noises about jacking it in not too long ago, on top of that it just felt like it had a bit of an Apex stench to it. I wasn’t in love with the matchup going in. My expectations weren’t high. It was actually pretty fun though. Not sure about them getting FOTN over Max vs Dustin or even D-Rod vs Holland but whatever. They’ll be making considerably less money than the main eventers and I certainly don’t begrudge them getting an extra 50G for a fight like this. Yeah enjoyed it. Wasn’t pretty but they both went for it. Marvin’s shown in the past he’s capable of these kind of dogfights. He’s got it in him and it comes out with the right opponent. Maybe him and Allen having a bit of beef going in lit a fire under both. Sad to hear Vettori just lost his brother as well.

Had no idea about that but apparently he died in a house fire in April at just 29 years old. Crazy that Marvin even fought last night under the circumstances. Apparently Allen tried to squash the bad blood with Vettori after the fight and offer condolences for the loss of his brother, and according to Allen, Vettori’s coach got between them and started talking shit. I’ve seen a few people talking about it but I don’t think it actually aired on the broadcast so fuck knows. I’m not a fan of Allen but I actually felt a bit bad for him here. He gave a shout out to his brother (who recently had an accident and is now in a wheelchair) after the fight and people are giving him all kinds of shit for being disrespectful because Vettori just lost his brother. I get it doesn’t look great on the surface but Allen had his own reasons for mentioning his brother, it was the first time his brother had been able to attend one of his fights since the accident. I don’t think it was in any way some kind of dig at Vettori and Allen’s comments about it since seem sincere. If it wasn’t for his brother’s situation I’d be saying “read the room” like everyone else but Allen was in a weird spot here. He would’ve been shouting out his brother whoever his opponent here was just because of the situation. It just so happened the opponent was Vettori who’d just lost his brother. All he might be guilty of is not wording it better in the cage. His comments at the press conference after made it clear what his intention was.

Couldn’t get into the Veretennikov vs Prado fight. I kind of like Prado and I enjoyed a couple of his fights early in his UFC run. But for a young guy his career is going nowhere fast. I don’t even really rate Veretennikov but Prado fighting at 170 is clearly a mistake. He just doesn’t have the frame for Welterweight and Veretennikov was able to exploit that at times. Even with the size disadvantage, Prado had some success but I just don’t know what the thought process is behind him fighting at 170.

Ateba Gautier again with the quick and violent finish. He’s not fucking about. I like this guy. Feels like a lazy and obvious comparison but I get mini Francis Ngannou vibes off him…

Can’t put too much stock into him bashing up a no hoper like Robert Valentin but it’s early days with Gautier so I’m fine with him just feasting on a few ham and eggers for now. He’s one of the few young guys coming up at Middleweight who actually looks like he could have some real potential. And he’s 23 years old, why rush him? Still loads of questions he’ll have to answer, he could fizzle out in his next fight for all I know, but he gives me a little bit of hope for the future of 185 at least.

Islam Dulatov made an impression in his UFC debut. Hadn’t really paid much attention to him, I just kind of zone out with these new guys coming in off DWCS at this point, so he went under my radar. Might be decent though. It was only Adam Fugitt but Dulatov dealt with him in style…

Improves to 12-1 and hasn’t lost since his pro debut. Just about to turn 27. Interesting guy. A fashion model who’s apparently got his fingers in lots of pies business-wise and I’ve read he’s already pretty wealthy. Yet he’s doing this purely for the love of the game. Knowing all that, it remains to be seen if he’s got the heart for it when he faces some real adversity because he doesn’t need to fight. But we’ll see. Worth keeping an eye on.

Jimmy Crute’s first round armbar on Marcin Prachnio was gnarly. If something didn’t break in Prachnio’s arm then it was very close. Prachnio might be getting his walking papers now. 37 years old, been subbed in three out of his last four fights and he’s going absolutely nowhere. Still not convinced Crute’s got much of a future but he really needed this win after a bunch of bad results. His mullet is spectacular. Proper 80s style. There’s a Fight Night coming in Perth in September, safe to assume Crute’s a lock for that.

Even Spann vs Brzeski didn’t bore me, which is a minor miracle! I was literally sat there with my thumb hovering over the fast forward button as soon as the fight started, such were my low expectations, but Spann got him out of there quick time with the guillotine.

Brunno Ferreira made short work of Jackson McVey. I’ve said a few times Ferreira is entertaining to watch. He’s never gonna go too far but win or lose he brings it and you need some guys like that in the middle of the pack in any division. I’m not a fan of Middleweight in general but Ferreira makes things a bit more tolerable. Nice quick sub here. Shite way to debut for McVey.

And I didn’t see the rest of the fight so I don’t know how she looked overall but Carli Judice scored a beautiful stoppage in the curtain jerker on Fight Pass. Brutally shut Nicolle Caliari’s whole system down with a perfectly placed knee to the liver…

Nasty stuff. Shades of De Ridder in his last fight against Bo Nickal. This came in the third round and from what I read Judice was winning comfortably before that anyway. Not sure how good she actually is but I might actually have to start taking more notice of her. She’s had a couple of big finishes now and it’s not like there are a ton of Flyweights doing that.



Overall a pretty enjoyable card. I shat on the undercard a bit going in but, fair’s fair, it was more fun than I expected in the end. It was always gonna be all about the main event though and, despite him not going out on a win, it still felt like Poirier got to end it on a positive note. Even with the loss, that was a pretty special send-off.

It feels like the right time but I’m definitely gonna miss the Diamond.

Edited July 21, 2025 by wandshogun09

[Dai]

Yeah, I enjoyed the main card too.

I agree with the 4-1 scorecards, too, as I was thinking going into the 5th that it was clearly 3-1 at that point. Max was 1 or 2 steps ahead of Dustin for pretty much the whole fight. No point going into the details of the fight, as it was such a great fight between two of the best ever, and the respect they had also, but taking a step back from all that, it was clear going into R4 that Dustin was behind and getting constantly bettered in his initial gameplan, so maybe he should of tried to mix it up a bit and go to plan B.

The commentators for the Johnson fight annoyed me too. They channelled the spirit of Rogan and just got completley suckered in by the body kicks of Zellhube, and talked about nothing else, completley ignoring the fact he was losing the fight and doing bigger all apart from them.

Pitbull looked like shit for 90% of the fight, and got the no interview treatment. Didnt help his cause here, despite the win.

The Holland fight was a great scrap. Not there for the FOTY award list, but not too far off. 

Costa did indeed look good, but thats all down to how bad Kopylov was. Thought he had a mare in this one. Completley one dimensional and just plodded along to a decision loss.

[Zaheer]

6 hours ago, Panhead said:

I'll be honest, I've felt really indifferent towards the UFC this year. Bar the odd fight, my excitement for it has been the lowest it's ever been in the 10+ years that I've been watching it. as a nice reminder of what got me watching MMA in the first place  

Not to hijack this, or probably for a separate thread but is this becoming the general consensus?
I was OBSESSED With UFC. Ever since TUF 9, I remember watching all the other TUFs 1-8 before the 10th.
I'd watch all PPVs, full prelims and every single show.

Now I genuinely can't be bothered with it.

I look at the card and there's one good/decent match if that. They used to put on banger of cards where every fight felt huge. Could it be the lack of superstar power/draws? 

It's not just me that's changed like this so drastically? I can't remember the last time I watched a full fight let alone a show.

 

What happened?!

[jimufctna24]

I started cherry picking shows and fights to watch many years ago, rather than try to consume everything the UFC puts out. Therefore I am probably not best qualified to analyse how good or bad the UFC product is as a whole nowadays.

Still, from what I have read from others, the overall quality of UFC shows has diminished since the Pandemic, and this decline in quality has seemingly coincided with the introduction of the Apex (I've noticed Wand and Jack Slack use the term "Apex Slop"). Apparently the UFC ran the same number of shows in 2014 that they do now, so it's not necessarIly a case of over-saturation, but rather just poor cards. Whether that is to do with poor matchmaking or/and other factors I am genuinely not sure. 

 

[Cousin Jim Bob]

 I was down to just the big cards then Trump being paraded and lauded at a bunch of those really started killing my interest.

The Tate brothers turning up cageside and Dana giving them a hug was the final straw for me. Just fucking unbelievable stuff. 

I still read Wand's threads and check the results. Probably out of habit but I don't watch anything now including highlights.

Edited July 21, 2025 by Cousin Jim Bob

[Egg Shen]

Yeah rough old night for picks here. I went 1-4 on that main card, I had a stinker.

[wandshogun09]

I never really touched on it in my big fuck off recap of the show but what do we think is next for Max now? For me there’s one answer, the Charles Oliveira rematch. Put the BMF strap on the line so we get a five rounder out of it. Perfect. I’ve been calling for that fight forever and it seems to be the fight a lot of people are suggesting now since Saturday night. It feels like the most obvious fight to make ever. Hopefully the UFC and matchmakers see the fan and media enthusiasm for that fight and get it made. Been wanting to see it since pretty much the second the first fight ended all the way back in 2015.

It’s a decade in the making and what I didn’t expect is that there’s apparently some needle between Max and Charles. With two good eggs like that you wouldn’t expect any bad feeling. I always assumed if it happened it’d be a similar thing to Max vs Dustin. Just respectful competition. But Max was on the ‘About Last Fight’ podcast on Saturday after the fight and when Chris Weidman asked him what’s next, Max said this…

“The ball is in UFC’s court. We’ll see what happens, what they wanna do. I know there was a lot of people calling this a gimmick belt and now all of a sudden it’s legit now and they wanna fight for the BMF. There’s Oliveira. I heard he was yapping, saying that our first fight was injuries, that he had an injury when we fought. Last time I checked, when they did a follow up and they wanted to find out what the injury was, there was no injury report on it. They said he was fine so I have no idea what the hell he’s talking about.”

Sign me up for this bastard. What else could even be next for Max if not this? I’ve seen the odd mention of a Topuria rematch but, while it might be interesting with the new wrinkle of it being up at 155 this time, I feel like it’s too soon for that rematch. I think Topuria’s more likely to be fighting Makhachev, Tsarukyan or even Paddy Piglett next. Max vs Charles 2 just feels like the fight to make now.

Gotta say as well, I do like how Max is looking so far at 155. For years there was doom and gloom about his chances at Lightweight because of how that 2019 Poirier fight went but I always thought that was bollocks. It was one fight, against prime Poirier, and Max didn’t embarrass himself. To write him off for life at 155 on the strength of that was shite. But that seemed to be what people were doing because most fans were still acting like Max going back up to 155 to fight Gaethje last year was some crazy suicide mission. But he looked great in that Gaethje fight and we know how it ended. And I thought he looked really good against Poirier on Saturday night. He definitely seems to have more venom in his punches at 155. Obviously, faceplant KOing Gaethje was evidence of that but he was also dropping and hurting Poirier here in a way he wasn’t able to do in their previous fights. It’s definitely a healthier weight class for him and especially now he’s older and naturally bigger. He probably should’ve sacked off the cut to Featherweight a bit sooner if anything. I still don’t see him becoming ‘the guy’ at 155. I think he’s always gonna have trouble with Topuria, Tsarukyan could be a problem and if Makhachev comes back down to LW that’s obviously gonna be a tough one. But I’d give him a good shot at beating anyone else in the division. 

Edited July 21, 2025 by wandshogun09

[Egg Shen]

I think they may go Topuria/Max II. Like you said, that added wrinkle at 155lb and Max seemingly having developed some serious KO power may push it over the line. They may stick that BMF thing in the mix too. 

I still want to see Topuria/Pimblett personally.

[wandshogun09]

Ideally I’d go Topuria vs Paddy, Holloway vs Oliveira 2 and maybe Tsarukyan vs Gaethje but I can’t see Gaethje going for that because he’s adamant he deserves a title shot. 

[jimufctna24]

I meant to post this after Wand's write up of the second Holloway vs DP bout.

Poirier was a different beast at Lightweight. He developed into a better striker technically with the modified shoulder roll ("he's blocking weird" - Holloway), but he was also way more durable at that weight than he had been at Featherweight. Very difficult match-up for another fighter that primarily strikes. 

Therefore I have to agree with Wand that Holloway losing to Poirier in 2019 wasn't a definitive indicator that the former would have no success at 155lbs. 

Holloway vs Oliveria would be fun. I think Max would win.

 

[wandshogun09]

Dustin with a really honest assessment of the fight and his performance on Saturday…